


Boys Will Be Boys

by Stormvoël (BushRat8)



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Little boys getting into trouble, Little boys having fun, Smuggling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:14:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24935875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BushRat8/pseuds/Stormvo%C3%ABl
Summary: A brief look at 5-year-old Hector Barbossa as he goes gallivanting about with his friends.
Relationships: Hector Barbossa/Childhood Friends
Kudos: 10





	Boys Will Be Boys

**Author's Note:**

> _Porthpyra_ is what we know today as the village of Polperro.
> 
> _Taking a drink of the sea_ is a sailor's term for drowning.
> 
> Peak Rock lies at the western mouth of the inlet to Porthpyra's harbor and offers dramatically scenic views of the ocean. It's must-see for tourists today. Porth Talan and Looe lie a few miles east of Porthpyra. The distance there and back would be nothing at all for a child of the era to walk.
> 
> Women and children, in Porthpyra's smuggling heyday, were as active in the trade as the men were. There was a customs agent living in the village, but he rarely managed to catch anyone.
> 
> Eseld is Hector's oldest sister.

-oOo-

Little boys grow up fast in Porthpyra. Their fathers ply the dangerous trades of fishermen, sailors, and smugglers; their mothers are worn out from their daily work and having more babies than they can handle; each winter is a battle against illness and starvation. Death is a constant visitor in the village, and there isn't a family that hasn't been touched by it, whether by drowning, by miscarriage or in childbed, or losing children who are simply too frail to live. 

But if that boy is a robust little five-year-old named Hector Barbossa, life is full of adventure, too, as he climbs the trees and hills that surround his home or nets a bird to supplement the evening's dinner; as he races up and down Porthpyra's steep, narrow lanes and snitches a sweet bun or two off Old Man Rundle's bakery cart, then sits quietly, munching on his stolen goods, as he contemplates the blue expanse of the sea and wonders where upon it his father might be traveling.

Hector isn't the only five-year-old boy in Porthpyra, and he's made fast friends with two of the others: Jago Penketh and Branok Jorey. Branok is Hector's cousin on his mother's side, with the auburn hair and blue eyes that mark all the Joreys, while Jago is six whole months older than his pals, which makes him quite the grand old man of the trio. Their fathers are smugglers along with Martinho Barbossa, although Jago's Da fishes, too, on those days when the catching is good.

On this misty grey morning, the boys are off on an escapade that would worry their mothers sick if they knew about it: snagging a bag of apples from a neighbor's tree (Melyor Barbossa's tree has already been picked bare and its fruit preserved or dried), a fresh, crusty loaf of bread from Old Man Rundle, and lifting a round of soft, mild cheese from Mistress Trevose's market stand. Little they may be, but they're already accomplished thieves; a trait, perhaps, that comes from their smugglers' descent.

With their tasty, ill-gotten gains, the boys take a short walk, careful of their footing, to the very edge of Peak Rock that faces out on the ocean, to sit eating their lunch while watching the waves crash on the rocks below. None of them can swim, and they nervously rag each other about what would happen if they found themselves in the furiously pounding water. "Hmm… I hope I take m' drink of th' sea right quick!" Hector says, peering down, while Branok shrinks back a bit, seating himself more firmly amongst the weeds that grow between the rocks, as though they will attach themselves to his trousers and hold him where he is.

Jago thumps Hector on the arm. "Me Da says he'll teach me t' swim one day soon," he tells him proudly.

_Oh, sure he will!_ Hector thinks to himself, as everyone knows Keneder Penketh can't swim a stroke. But he isn't so unkind as to say it.

The mist turns to soft rain after awhile, but it doesn't bother the boys a bit; not these Porthpyran boys for whom water is as natural an element as air. They troop along the footpaths and hike up and down the hillsides, daring each other not to tumble (although Branok gets a skinned knee nonetheless); stop to explore caves on the beach, just in case the last smugglers might have left something interesting for them to find, from a bag of fine French salt for preserving their families' fish to a stray bit of tea or brandy. Hector and his friends are warned every day by their mothers that they mustn't take chances on the steep, wet rocks, nor play where a gang of smugglers might suddenly row in and decide that the boys pose a danger to their goods or their freedom.

They don't listen. They never listen; not when they know that their mothers, of all people and in spite of their worry, know perfectly well what their fathers do and that Martinho and his fellow smugglers would never allow harm to come to any boy from the village. The child of one is the child of all; and, if the worst should happen and an excise agent happens to appear, the men will hide them and lie through their teeth rather than give them up to the law.

The fear that the boys will fall or drown is another thing entirely, though. Melyor and the other mothers agitate constantly about that, and for good reason: Hector and his friends are reckless little urchins with — usually! — feelings of immortality. Their uneasiness around crashing waves and deep ponds aside, there isn't a slippery slope they can't climb or a cave too black and endless that they're fearful of getting lost inside it. From their explorations, they know the beaches and countryside for miles around, and they can find their way back home with only the moon and stars to guide their way.

While their fathers do no more than shrug and say, "Boys will be boys" when told about it, their mothers aren't pleased with their sons' habit of pilfering lunch, either. "No need t' bring th' constable down on yer head!" Melyor says sharply one evening when Hector comes home after an outing with Branok and Jago, his pocket handkerchief wrapping a morsel of a bun she didn't bake and cheese she didn't buy. "What kind of rep'tation d' ye want this family t' get? We bain't thieves!"

Biting his tongue to keep from smiling, Hector says nothing while she berates him. Not thieves? What should he say to that, when both the Jorey clan's men and his father are some of the best-known local smugglers? Should he remind his mother that the blue dress she's wearing is made of cloth brought in under cover of darkness and was a gift from Martinho even before he and Melyor were wed; blue Spanish cloth that's the color of her eyes? "Aye, Mum; sorry, Mum," he finally murmurs.

Sighing, Melyor doesn't tell him not to do it again, because she knows he will. All she can do is pat his head and his cheek, her touch saying, _If ye must be light-fingered, Hector, please don't get caught. I couldn't bear it if'n th' law came an' took ye away from me._ "See that y' are, little boy," she reproves him gently, pinching his chin, then kissing his temple. "Now, if ye've room for supper in that bottomless pit ye call a stomach, I'll have Eseld fetch a bucket of water so's ye can wash yerself up; ye've th' mud an' sand of three towns on ye!"

Hector rolls his eyes; like all little boys, washing is something he'd just as soon forego, and he'd prefer to be dirty. But that's no nevermind to him; not when he'll meet up with Jago and Branok tomorrow, stealing a good lunch (in deference to his mother's wishes and his own sense of self-preservation, he'll be careful) before running off to Porth Talan or Looe, getting thoroughly grimy along the way.

For tonight, though, he'll eat his mother's good meal of pilchards and potatoes fried in pork fat, then get into his bed and sleep, dreaming that his father's finally come home.

Life is good, when you're five-year-old Hector Barbossa.

  
-oOo- FIN -oOo-


End file.
